Small Wonders: Insects in Focus

This exhibit, at the Temecula Valley Museum, is where art meets science! I loved it all.

Though insects are the most diverse organisms on the planet, it is estimated that twelve million kinds of insects are in existence today with only 1/12th of them having been described by scientists.

Additionally, their variety and beauty are seldom available for close examination due to the simple fact that insects are small and often hidden from view, even when captured and put under a magnifying lens. Moreover, the detailed textures and color patterns of most insects cannot be captured with traditional methods of photography.

Bob Sober, the artist behind Small Wonders: Insects in Focus, provides viewers with unparalleled access to previously unseen details of his amazing insect subjects.

As opposed to taking magnified single-shot photographs of his subjects, which results in a loss of detail in areas outside of the narrow photographic depth of field, Sober composes his insect portraits from hundreds, or even thousands. of photographs stacked into a single digital composite image. This method produces images with extremely high resolution and great focal depth. Sober then prints the composite images at a relatively monumental scale in comparison to the minute subject matter; some prints in this exhibition are more than six feet tall. The artist's choice to print the images on aluminum sheets preserves the resolution of the original photographic composite while also referencing the hard, outer shell of each insect.

In addition to providing an unprecedented vision of microscopic structure and coloration, Sober's work also captures the exceptional diversity of insects: a Lanternfly with elegant shading on its membranous, butterfly-like wings; a Flower Beetle whose armored shell is emblazoned with holographic shapes; the coarse white fur of the Cottonwood Borer. In the end, Sober's astounding photographs provide us with an education about our small neighbors while reminding us that variations among the insects in Small Wonders are greater than any differences that may exist among the humans viewing them.